Being Vulnerable
by aiupenn
Summary: After a violent encounter on a mission, Atsushi has to bandage Akutagawa's wounds in a shared hotel room.


The two exhausted men stare at the single bed in defeat. Silence spreads between them, until finally Akutagawa wills his feet to move. He doesn't say anything, but his weary body sighs in relief when he sets down his bag. Atsushi pipes up behind him. "I get the bed."

Akutagawa bites back a groan. He normally wouldn't mind sleeping on the ground, but this time...

He checks the carpet behind him slyly. A few tell-tale red specks stick on the top of the fibers, but nothing that Atsushi would notice.

"I'm taking a bath" Akutagawa finally manages in response.

He closes the bathroom door and stands there for a long while, finally allowing himself some heaving breaths. He's reveling in this rare moment, letting out a whimper and a shiver. He shakes himself out of it quickly, taking off Roshomon-helpfully hiding his blood with its dark fabric. It's more work to peel off the white, now completely red-stained shirt underneath. Bits of it stick behind in the wounds, having been forced into them as he'd been slashed by what felt like thousands of tiny daggers.

Honestly, Akutagawa had been through worse. He'd had deeper cuts, been in more uncomfortable situations, lost more blood... But the pure amount of them seemed to be making him lightheaded with pain. He stumbled over to the tub, and slipped into it, turning on the faucet with much more effort than should be necessary. The water was honestly too cold, but he didn't dare move to change the temperature. He had to suck in breath as the chilly water lapped at each individual cut. It burned.

It took longer than he would admit for him to get the nerve to start washing out the wounds. The water turned a deep shade of cloudy red, and the bottom gained a layer of gravel and debris that had washed out of the wounds.

Some of the cuts simply would not stop bleeding, but by the time the majority of them had, he was exhausted. He felt heavy and worried if he didn't get out soon, he might just fall asleep there in the water. With great effort, he dragged himself out of the tub.

He stared off into the distance as it drained, regaining his composure as best he could in his hazy state. After he felt steady on his feet again, he picked up the shredded bits of shirt and reluctantly shoved it into the trash. He hated the thought of going shirtless all night with someone else in the room, and put Roshomon on. The touch of it caused the little cuts to scream, but he ignored them.

His vision was going a bit blurry and even though he hadn't checked to make sure the tub wasn't stained red, he didn't have it in him to wash it out. He pushed the shower curtain closed, and left the bathroom, flipping off the light.

Atsushi had turned off the room's light already and was snuggled into the bed. He could hear the other man's soft, even breathing, which made him relieved. He wouldn't have to face him like this. The thought of feeling weak in front of him would have made it all even worse.

Thankfully, Atsushi had laid out a stack of blankets and sheets for him, and Akutagawa basically collapsed into it. With less shame than he should have felt, he buried himself into the makeshift bed like a cat. While he had hoped to fall asleep immediately, something in his brain seemed to be stopping him from losing consciousness. It could be the sense of imminent death, but he pushed that thought away. It never helped to be over-dramatic. Still, he lay awake for what felt like hours, but it might've only been minutes.

Just as he was feeling a bit more ready to fall asleep, Atsushi's steady breathing became quicker as he woke up. Akutagawa shut his eyes tighter. Soft footsteps made their way to the bathroom; the light switch clicked on, and he heard the other man suck in a breath.

I should've covered my tracks better, he realized too late.

Atsushi's footsteps neared him. "Akutagawa?"

The black-haired man opened his eyes slowly, refusing to look up at his partner, staring at his pant leg.

"Are you okay?"

"Fine," he growled, "Let me sleep."

The leg left his view for only a moment and the room's light switched on. Atushi sucked in another breath. "You are not fine," he said, a tinge of concern lacing the annoyed statement. "Let me bandage you up, if you won't yourself."

A hand lightly touched his shoulder, but Akutagawa shied away from the touch, his skin burning underneath the layers of fabric.

A beat, then, "God, Akutagawa..." Atsushi's voice was very hushed.

The shift had revealed the sheets were now turned a deep shade of red. Obviously, one of his wounds was bleeding more than Akutagawa had realized-or bothered to care.

Atsushi knelt down next to him and reached towards him again. For a second, he had a fleeting thought of letting him take care of him, but that was the blood loss talking. He was fine. He didn't need shit.

There was another gentle touch to his upper arm, and Rashomon reacted instantly. A tendril snapped up Atsushi's wrist and forced him to the ground with a loud thump. Akutagawa followed with it, pinning the white-haired man's other arm down.

He didn't even have a second to be embarrassed by the position they were in-Akutagawa now straddling him and discovering that Atsushi was, in fact, shirtless-before he collapsed on him with a wave of vertigo. He could hear Atsushi's heartbeat now that his cheek rested on his partner's warm chest. It was a little fast, but calming to Akutagawa in his inebriated state. Under normal circumstances, he would have known to retreat in a flurry of faked anger, but right now he didn't have the will. His limbs were so heavy, he wasn't sure he could've anyways. So he stayed there, and listened to the other man's heart beat.

Atsushi took a long moment and a deep, shaky breath, before he moved his wrist out of Rashomon's grasp. "Akutagawa?" his voice was wary, "Are you okay?"

He couldn't even protest this time. The rabid dog just lay there in defeat, his silence speaking volumes.

"I'm going to bandage you up."

Silence.

Atsushi slowly and as gently as possible moved out from underneath him, and then hurried around the hotel room for a moment. The whole time, Akutagawa worked up the energy to sit up. He eventually got it, but not without an accidental grunt. He should be mortified, disgusted, objecting, anything. He wasn't. He was exhausted.

Not long after he'd dragged himself up, Atsushi returned and settled himself next to him. He looked at him questioningly and Akutagawa stared back with an empty gaze.

"Take off your coat," the man-tiger finally said.

This he did have the wherewithal to object to. His gaze hardened to stone. Now that he thought about it, it was to be expected. But that didn't make it go down any better. It wasn't being shirtless in front of Atsushi that was a problem, it was being shirtless in front of anyone. He wouldn't say he was ashamed-he'd never say that-but he knew how his body looked. Small and damaged and weak. Somehow, he would just stare until Atsushi gave up and find a way to bandage him up without removing this last layer of protection, as impossible as he knew it was.

"I'll rip it off you if I have to," Atsushi said, almost nonchalantly. Then, he sucked in a breath, as if he'd wished he'd never said it all.

Akutagawa thought about this for a very long time, and Atsushi said nothing else in that time. Eventually, the weight of his limbs caused Akutagawa to give in with a shudder, and he shrugged off Rashomon begrudgingly. There were several more oozing cuts than he'd originally thought, but none of them were bleeding to profusely. If it weren't for the obvious anemia, he wouldn't have bothered to stanch it.

He folded his hands in his lap, his skin burning in embarrassment. He felt exposed and stupid and honestly scared and he just wanted to cover back up and pretend-

But Atsushi didn't say anything at all. He just got to work wrapping the bandages around Akutagawa's torso. The latter stared at his head with a mixture of shock and confusion, expecting every moment for something to be said like 'you're so skinny!' or 'you don't look so tough'. But, he never did. Eventually, Akutagawa's mind just went blank as he watched him do it. It was a bit of a rhythmic motion and it stilled his mind.

Atsushi sighed at one point to go get more medical supplies, but otherwise they just sat there in silence, not making eye-contact as one tended to the other.

"There," Atsushi finally said after ten minutes, "I think that's all of them."

He pecked at the bandages, probably looking for anywhere already bleeding through, but Akutagawa didn't give him much of a chance. As soon as he'd said "all" he'd started shoving Rashomon back on. He felt unbelievably relieved to be covered once again. Atsushi hands hovered in the air, like he planned to do something, but recovered eventually. He stood and grabbed the card key. "I'll be right back. Don't fall asleep"

Akutagawa almost said "wait" against his will, but he thankfully bit his tongue just in time. He was being uncharacteristically dependent tonight.

In the interim, he tried to shuffle the sheets in such a way that he wouldn't be sleeping in his own blood. There wasn't much chance of that, and he was getting more tired just trying. Eventually, he leaned on the side of the bed and just as his eyes were drifting closed...

A hand grasped his shoulder tight. "Ryunosuke!"

Akutagawa jolted, coming out of his sleepy reverie. He hadn't fallen asleep yet, but Atsushi stared at him with his violet eyes wide. His mouth was twisted into a uncertain and horrified expression. Akutagawa stared back almost defiantly, keeping his gaze stone cold, but that was hard to manage as his heart was racing with the use of his given name. He didn't know what had possessed Atsushi to use it, but he hoped it never happened again as it was making him terribly flustered.

After a moment, Atsushi let out a trembling sigh of relief and fell back on his bottom. Akutagawa only noticed now that Atsushi was shaking, probably from adrenaline. "What happened?"

"I thought you'd died."

Akutagawa scoffed. Ever the drama-queen. "It would take a lot more to kill me, man-tiger."

"Yeah..." Atsushi trailed off. He'd been expecting a snarky response in return, but this simple one left Akutagawa feeling strange.

Atsushi held out a grocery bag. "Got some pills for iron deficiency and cashews," he said in explanation, "and tomato juice. Eat up."

Akutagawa scowled and peaked into the bag. "Don't need it." He set the bag aside defiantly.

"If you don't, I'll change your bandages in the morning."

Akutagawa stilled and then opened the bag of cashews. He chewed them with a lot of distaste. Their bitter saltiness didn't please him.

"You need to ask me when you need help..." Atsushi said after a while, "Like it or not, we're a team now."

"No." Akutagawa wasn't sure which part of the statement he was saying 'no' to, but he saw that it stung Atsushi. That didn't sit well with him emotionally, but rationally, he knew he needed to sever this moment of weakness from Atsushi's brain. Being harsh was a very efficient way of doing that.

Atsushi didn't take it lying down, for once. "Yes!" he shot back, "Yes you will, otherwise I'll have to check you over every time we're together because if you die on me..." his angry words paused as if he was searching for what was appropriate to say, "I'll... I'll have the Port Mafia after me and I already have enough trouble!"

The anger had left his voice completely by the time he said 'trouble', but Akutagawa elected to ignore it, not wanting to think about the implications of it all.

He chewed on another cashew and then took the meds with the tomato juice. Atsushi sighed and crawled up onto the bed. "I'm turning on the TV."

"I want to sleep," Akutagawa growled.

"Fat chance. Sleep on the way back."

Atsushi settled on something eventually, and despite all his whining (although he loathed to call it that), Akutagawa snuck glances to it constantly, eventually becoming engaged in the nonsense.

He dragged himself up onto the bed with Atsushi after a lot of hesitance (and a lot of more logical thoughts that told him not to). To his great surprise, once he had, Atsushi grabbed his wrist. Akutagawa heated up almost immediately, completely flushed with embarrassment. He tried to jerk the grip away, but failed. He forgot how strong the man-tiger was sometimes.

"I'm just feeling for your pulse," Atsushi said, but he didn't let go.

* * *

Comments and critique are always appreciated!


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